Ching Hai Soars Above the Fray

In September 2008, the Nice-Matin, the hometown newspaper of France's fifth largest city, asked, in bold frontpage headlines, HAS A DANGEROUS SECT SET UP CAMP IN OUR REGION?

The accompanying two-page inside spread of articles and pictures left little doubt as to the conclusion the reader should draw... The former head of the 'Renseignements Généraux' (intelligence service) was quoted as saying that the group has been on France's official list of dangerous sects since the early 1990s. Why? According to the same source, this 'sect' (a label the French public has been conditioned to respond to with fear and loathing) might influence its members to act against their own best interests (as defined by ?). And what teachings of this 'sect' are considered so potentially dangerous? Well, the group's 'guru', Ching Hai, a Vietnamese spiritual leader whose followers number more than forty thousand and come from all over the world, enjoins those who would be enlightened to start by becoming vegan. Ching Hai may not have realized that she was thus touching on a bugaboo tenaciously denounced by the authorities here (whether the right or left controls the government) who, no surprise, defend powerful agro-industrial interests.

To place this Nice-Matin article in the context of French public opinion, we should recall the great hullabaloo that was made by the media, just a few years ago, over a young man in Brittany, touted in news reports as a vegan, who died, we were told, of nutritional deficiencies. Those who read beyond the headlines learned that he had eaten nothing but brown rice for years before his death, hardly a diet that vegans recommend. Even in India, where some Indian men do hard labor on a rice diet with no fruit or vegetables, their rice is nonetheless supplemented by lentils (making a complete vegetable protein) and they remain healthy and strong. In any case, it would be difficult to find any vegan who would tout a long-term rice-only diet (macrobiotics who counsel rice only for eliminating toxins, insist on a limit of ten consecutive days). Still, this death provided timely ammunitiion against the small, but vocal, and growing, vegan movement in France. And no vegan had an opportunity to speak out in the media to answer the disinformation.

In 2004-2005, and again in 2008, there were two highly celebrated cases (because again pounced on by the media to 'prove' that a vegan diet is 'sectarian and dangerous') of infants dying, in which the vegan parents were held responsible and arrested. Doctors were interviewed as 'experts', for television, radio and in newspaper reports, stating categorically that, although they were unrelated to these cases and had not examined the children, death had been due to 'severe nutritional deficiencies', since no other outcome is possible, as a vegan mother's milk cannot be adequate to the nutritional needs of her child... Even if these 'experts' were ignorant of English and American studies which have thoroughly debunked this idea, one would think that French doctors, men and women, would have sufficient culture and knowledge of the world to remember that, beyond the borders of France, there are whole continents where the people have eaten a 'vegan' diet for millennia, yet they and their infants do not die of severe nutritional deficiencies...

In the first of these two much publicized cases, the parents, highly intelligent university graduates, professional people, were nevertheless prosecuted, found guilty and sentenced to prison. They were released from incarceration 'early', after 'only' eight months, and (a coincidence? or a deal done?) immediately gave a press conference in which they announced (in shades of the Inquisition and Galileo?) that they had come to understand the error of their deviant ways and had returned to a 'healthy' meat diet... (Yes, this really did happen, in France, in 2005...)

By the time of the second case, just last year, the news reporting, perhaps (justifiably) criticized in the first instance, made more of an effort to appear balanced in that a couple of 'ordinary' vegans were interviewed for their opinions. Unfortunately, the two selected to speak out were not particularly skilled public speakers and, in the few seconds of air-time allowed, their words did not carry the same weight as the juxtaposed opinions of doctors and professors (the 'experts') who continue to denounce a vegan diet as inevitably catastrophic for a baby (and for everyone else, for that matter).

Such flagrant manipulation of French public opinion succeeds for lack of reporting an alternative 'expert' position and because the public, isolated in its linguistic and cultural chauvinism, is raised, in this rigid class structure, to look up to designated, infallible 'experts'. After all, those who have had the benefit of higher education (not an option for the vast majority) and who thus belong to the elite of society, they must 'know', as opposed to the broad public which, lacking such education and social privileges, is not in a position to 'know'... Thus, truth becomes what the experts say it is, particularly when backed up by tradition (as if the French public has always consumed meat, fish, dairy and so on, in the quantities consumed today)...

Thus, the rigid class system here, which has surivived not only the French Revolution, but also all five of the French Republics, including the present one, continues to serve those in power, no longer the monarchy and the artistocracy, ruling by right of blood, but instead, today, those whose right to rule is based on their holdings of money and power and influence. The common people remain on the bottom, manipulated, exploited, and ignorant-- but complacent under the banner of the (yet-to-be-realized) ideals of Liberty, Equality and Fraternity, having been 'bought off', since the Second World War, by the ever accumulating 'comforts' of the consumer society...

In the United States, by contrast, the opinions of common people, while no less an object of manipulation, are not so easily duped by 'experts', who can be bought, as everyone knows, for a dime a dozen. Such opinions are thus not treated with reverence but rather are perfectly open to criticism, either from the people themselves, or from the intellectuals who side with them. And most importantly, such criticism of 'experts' can find its way into media reporting, even when attacking weighty agro-industrial interests, and even despite the millions of dollars poured into public relations firms for highly creative 'smoke screens'. Not only does the vast majority of the French public never question expert opinions but, speaking French only, it forgets, or never learns, that beyond France's borders, there is a world which is quite different from that which their experts describe...

But, back to Ching Hai... The second Nice-Matin's report (in the week following the first) focused on the observations and opinions of local citizens, neighbors of the 'camp' referred to in the headlines. Located in affluent Roquebrune Cap Martin, just outside Menton, on the French-Italian border, a half-an-hour's drive from Nice, this 'camp' was originally a hotel, bought by Ching Hai in summer 2008 with (it is said) the help of a rich benefactor. The former hotel has now been turned into a meditation center to receive, in successive groups of two hundred, her thousands of followers from all over the world, who come to meditate during short retreats. The Nice-Matin, suspending usual journalistic guidelines, published the fears and speculations expressed by the center's irate neighbors, all citations anonymous, in other words, gossip raised to the status of news, a feat which would have left my old journalism dean at Berkeley speechless (in horror).

What were the reproaches of the neighbors, as reported by the Nice-Matin? Well, the scores of visitors to the new center, mostly Asian, arrived on foot, in long, single-file lines and --even more suspicious-- they did not make any noise! Yes, the neighbors were up in arms because, whether coming or going, and while present at the center, Ching Hai's adepts are 'quiet' (perhaps the neighbors would have liked it better if the visitors had been noisy?). One woman claimed that from her balcony she could see over the walls of the meditation center, into the gardens where Ching Hai's followers, all dressed in white, sat crosslegged every night on the ground, in a circle, eating out of bowls, always in silence... My own interviews with a number of Ching Hai's followers raised gales of laughter over these allegations, which were dismissed as total fantasy. And, to top it off, one neighbor was quoted by the Nice-Matin as saying, essentially, It's true these people aren't hurting anyone, but their presence is unwelcome nevertheless...

Much was also made of Ching Hai's money, as if having money is an additionally suspicious factor, pointing to some kind of guilt. But guilt over what? Only inuendos and vague fears hang between the printed words... Claims were made that she spends lavishly, and at the best hotels and restaurants in Monaco. Even were these accusations true-- 'et alors?' (so what?) She is a producing artist and sells her art, according to the Nice-Matin, for fabulous prices... If that is suspicious, perhaps reporters should be detailed to investigate Christie's and all the local art galleries, as well...

In fact, Ching Hai's followers, passing from the airport, through Nice, on their way to and from Menton, have confirmed to me what she herself says, that she takes little care over her appearance, clothes and hair, other than that she be clean, because if she spends time on herself, this will make her less available for taking spiritual care of them.

Of course there have been celebrated cases of 'gurus' who manipulated the gullible, separating them from their money and exploiting them mercilessly, with Jonestown and the Solar Temple just two particularly grusome examples, each ending in a bloodbath. As mentioned, this danger has been so drilled into the heads of the French that merely evoking the word 'sect' sets off a powerful, negative reaction. (What people have forgotten is that Jesus and his followers are also an example of a sect that was persecuted by the authorities of the day, but which is viewed quite differently now. In other words, respecting elementary logic, all sects should not be put into the same basket...)

And so we have the climate in which Ching Hai has set up her center. Besides providing a tranquil place for meditation and for drawing strength from identification with others of like mind, Ching Hai sends her followers back out into the world with a mission-- to wake people up to the immanent danger to all life on our planet from global warming.

In fact, it is Ching Hai and her followers who, almost single-handedly, have forced the worldwide media to –finally-- report the story, untouched and untouchable for years, of what the most eminent scientists say about global warming... For we have not been told that the melting of the poles simultaneously creates toxic methane gas 'chimneys' in the polar seas. By the time the poles are gone, scientists estimate there will be so much toxic gas in the atmosphere that our earth will no longer sustain life as we know it now...

This information is bad enough, but worse are the eminent scientists' predictions about when this catastrophe will happen... For, at the current rate of meltdown, it has been calculated that the poles will be gone by summer 2012. And the most recent reports (end February 2009) from scientists monitoring the situation on the ground indicate that the meltdown has accelerated beyond all their worst fears... which doesn't leave Humanity much time to turn things around.

But Ching Hai's position is that there IS still hope. The meltdown CAN be stopped, even at this late hour. Our planet CAN be saved. How? By reducing global warming –fast-- and one easy step which each individual can take, without asking any permission, investing in any material or consulting anyone, is to stop supporting the industrial production of animals for human consumption, which, it is estimated, contributes more than 18% of the total greenhouse gases responsible for global warming.

This is the inconvenient truth which even Al Gore did not dare to mention...

At this point, let us take another short step back, to look again at the social dynamics of meat-eating in France...

It is little remembered, in this bastion of meat-based, thousands-of-years-old culinary traditions, that between the last two Great Wars, a large, popular, and influential vegetarian movement existed in France, and also in Germany and Switzerland, and to a lesser extent in other European countries. Health devotees propagated fasting cures for all diseases and detoxifying vegetarian diets to follow them up, which were also advised for preventing disease. Based on simply (and minimally) prepared plant-based food, this movement did not prosper after World War II, in the climate of exploding consumption after the years of severe privations. (This would be a worthwhile point of research for some sympathetic scholar, starting with Henri-Charles Geffroy's original La Vie Claire, a national chain of shops promoting healthy, unprocessed foods, and which, originally, rejected all animal products, flesh and otherwise, based on the founder's own experience of being cured of disease after spending years in the trenches of World War I. Instead of suffering from the food privations, he found himself restored to health!)

The meat, dairy, poultry (including egg) and fish industries, their production techniques industrialized as a result of the World War II need to rapidly produce massive, cheap quantities of food for the troops, had, in order to survive in peacetime, to convince civilians to consume these products, and not sparingly, as previously, but on an ever increasing scale. A reaction against the deprivations of the war years certainly contributed to disposing the public to heed the endless calls of professional propagandists, converted into public image manipulators and advertisers, brandishing the idea that it is not just fun, but healthy, to consume more and more meat and fish, and the by-products of these. Thus those who had always considered such food an occasional 'special dish', were suckered into believing that society was making progress in which they, too, could share by dining on these foods, on a daily basis, like the rich of yore. The result? A follow-on explosion in the medical industries of the number of patients suffering from so-called 'diseases of civilization', those directly related to lifestyle and diet (heart disease, cancer, diabetes, et al...). (By the way, is anyone still dupe enough to believe the claims that cures for these diseases are just around the bend, claims that inspire people to regularly part with cash for donations to medical research which promises, one day, to allow them to eat, drink and live as they please, without having to face the logical consequences, thanks to some pill, or vaccine, or other 'quick-fix'... Such pie in the sky is the promise on which the public pins its hopes while stuffing itself with processed non-foods that stimulate ever more jaded pallates, sometimes with a few synthetic vitamens tossed in, to justify noisy claims of contributing to health (in reality, just more smoke, clouding the truth)...

But people like Ching Hai, by their very natures, disperse the confusion that clouds the issues. Ching Hai attracts mainly ordinary people with her teachings, although there are also intellectuals and members of society's elite who have heard and responded, out of social consciousness...

In October 2008, a new spread of articles in the New-Matin announced that Ching Hai and her group had (to translate the essence) 'turned tail and run'... Pictures were published in which one could see over the walls and into the gardens of the former hotel turned meditation center, now clearly empty. The impression given was that the Nice-Matin exposure had contributed to unmasking a group of dangerous and guilty people, who had responded by 'running away'.

In reality, Ching Hai is based in London, not France, and is well known for her propensity to travel... She had just gone off, somewhere else, as she usually does, sooner or later. In December, inconvenient for the Nice-Matin, she was back again, and the reception of the groups of her followers for meditiation retreats resumed...

Undaunted, a new article in the Nice-Matin declared (with no mention of the error of their October claims) 'Ching Hai Unveils herself' and 'They say they have nothing to hide', intimating, of course, the contrary... In any case, her followers told me that they had tried to dispell the bad publicity with their sincerity, inviting the most irate neighbors and the Nice-Matin reporters into the center. The result was just more suspicion, so, they shrugged, what could they do?

Since then, Ching Hai and her followers have gone quietly about their business. Groups of 'pilgrims' regularly make their ways from the Nice airport to Mention and back again, as discreet as ever. They are certainly not seeking any confrontations, but neither have they 'turned tail and run'. Ching Hai is quietly present, leading these retreats, unflustered by the misunderstanding of the locals. Some of those returning mention meeting her dogs, said to number five, and all rescues. Her followers always have her literature in hand, both in French and in English, explaining what the scientists say about the immanent danger of methane gas, and proposing a vegan lifestyle, to save the planet.

It is interesting to notice that, only a few weeks ago, BBC world service radio took up the subject of the methane gas chimineys for the first time. Friends in the States tell me the media there (where Ching Hai has many followers) is now, at long last, also reporting on the problem.

Let us hope that Ching Hai is right and that there is still hope that Humanity will, once again, survive a crisis that is, ultimately, of its own making. We can also hope that solving this crisis will convince people to never again trust the assurances of those who (particularly certain industries and their apologists) stand to profit by manipulating the public's behavior. But democratic and republican principles have always depended, for wise application, on an informed and responsible public. And being informed and responsible is something the public cannot depend on its present rulers to condone or encourage... Quite the contrary... Unfortunately.

This is wake-up time for Humanity, or else... But, we try not to contemplate the alternative...